Dilemma for the Cable Operators

For decades the cable companies have said, NO FTTH! It's blasphemy to the die-hard HFC folks. We didn't spend the last thirty years learning how to fine tune the cable system coax plant and customer drop just to see it all swept away by some stinking fiber!

Well we all know about progress; it follows the route to the biggest pot of gold. Once that pot of gold is FTTH and not HFC, guess what?

There are some who think it's necessary to rework DOCSIS so it can run over fiber.

There are some who think that replacing the drop with LTE will be the answer.

There are some who think an all IP DOCSIS 3.1 is the answer.

And, you have all the cable operators wondering which of these is the right choice. Each one means a visit to the investors, the banks and the CFO.

If it were your money, where would you place your bet?

Now, to make matters worse, which FTTH technology do you choose? EPON, GEPON, or GPON? Maybe it's just RFoG or perhaps you go wireless. Which one? FDD-LTE or TDD-LTE?

Or do you say, "The heck with it!" and just concentrate on stealing those ripe and juicy commercial accounts out of the hands of the Telcos and run Metro-Ethernet? OK, now which technology; WDM, EPON, GEPON, or GPON?

See? It's not easy. You need a handicapper (shameful plug - that's us), someone who doesn't work for a manufacturer. You need to see where the standards committees are headed and which manufacturers have investor confidence. You just can't rely on your brother-in-law to tell you which way to go, you have to make an informed decision.

We also need to face some truths here; it's going to be FTTH eventually. It may be a hybrid fiber-wireless solution, too. A new acronym, HFW.

Don't you think you need to learn and teach your techs about this stuff now?